Glossadelphus zollingeri

The moss name Glossadelphus zollingeri is now mostly treated as a synonym of Ectropothecium zollingeri, a species of the family Hypnaceae.¹² This moss grows in forests on soil, rock, rotting wood and the trunks and roots of trees, in tropical and subtropical Asia and on some South Pacific islands; it has not so far been kept in aquaria.¹

The name is nevertheless known in the aquarium hobby, because the “Bogor moss” reached Europe under it in 1968; Gerhard Benl presented it as a new aquarium moss in 1969.¹³ Botanically the Bogor moss is Taxiphyllum barbieri, an identification that goes back to Z. Iwatsuki (1982).¹³ It multiplied so quickly that in the following years it almost imperceptibly displaced the true Java moss (Vesicularia dubyana) from aquaria.³

1. Kasselmann, C. (2019): Aquarienpflanzen. 4th edition (German). - Ulmer Verlag, Stuttgart: p. 558.
2. Ectropothecium zollingeri – Flowgrow aquatic plant database (accessed 5 October 2026)
3. Glossadelphus zollingeri (Müll.Hal.) M.Fleisch. – WFO Plant List, World Flora Online (accessed 5 October 2026)